After producing the book Bembo's Zoo for his daughter, in which all of the animal pictures were composed with the letters of the animals' names, graphic designer Roberto de Vicq supplied his "author's photo" to his publisher as a similar collage of letters. That was the inspiration for this collection of author's portraits made entirely of letters in their names (men of letters—get it?). De Vicq selected fonts that could capture the particular lines of, say, Twain's moustache or Vonnegut's tousled curls, while also evoking the author's style or era. Here too, "People of Substance" are abstract portraits made of decorative symbols (dingbats) creating faces for such concepts as "autumn," "modern," and "red."